Overview
One of the key elements to regional peace and stability is defence. Its critical role in maintaining national security and the ability to muster assets and capabilities is assumed by the military. In the international setting, there has been an increasing recognition of the role of regional cooperation in promoting confidence among defence establishments.
ASEAN established the ASEAN Defence Ministers’ Meeting (ADMM) in 2006 and expanded it to engage its Dialogue Partners, through the ADMM-Plus in 2010.
Priority Areas of Cooperation
The cooperation in the defence sector has grown to include numerous areas of common concern. Under the ADMM, there are initiatives to address issues on maritime security (MS), humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HADR), military medicine (MM), counter-terrorism (CT), peacekeeping operations (PKO), defence industry, and border management. Similarly, the ADMM-Plus facilitates cooperation on MS, HADR, MM, CT, PKO, cyber security (CS) and humanitarian mine action (HMA) issues.
After its formative years, defence cooperation in ASEAN has begun to deliver more practical outcomes. For instance, the ADMM is now ready to respond jointly to natural disasters and to work together in mitigating the risks stemming from violent extremism, radicalisation and terrorism. The ADMM also trains military medical practitioners as well as chemical, biological and radiological defence experts. In recent years the defence sector has also engaged an increasing number of cross-sectoral issues to support more collaborative efforts and to ensure its relevance to the broader regional agenda.
Major Sectoral Bodies/Committees
The policy-making meetings are the ADMM/ADMM-Plus at the highest approving level, the ASEAN Defence Senior Officials’ Meeting (ADSOM)/ADSOM-Plus at the intermediate level where policy endorsement is usually made, and the ADSOM Working Group (WG)/ADSOM-Plus WG at the bottom of the structure where policy recommendation is produced.
For the ADMM, practical cooperation is facilitated by the “task groups” and the Bangkok-based ASEAN Center of Military Medicine, while the ADMM-Plus is facilitated through seven Experts’ Working Groups (EWGs).
Despite sharing a similar structure, the ADMM maintains the prerogative over the membership and modality of the ADMM-Plus, to preserve the concept of ASEAN Centrality. The ADMM and the ADMM-Plus meet annually whereas the supporting policy-making meetings are held more frequently as deemed fit. In addition to the annual meeting with ADMM Plus, the ASEAN Defence Ministers also hold regular Retreats.
The issue of defence cooperation is also discussed under the ambit of the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF). Within the ARF, defence cooperation is addressed through the ARF Security Policy Conference (ASPC), ARF Defence Officials’ Dialogue (DOD), and the ARF Heads of Defence/Universities/Colleges/Institutions Meeting (HDUCIM). These mechanisms are intended to provide a platform for ARF Participants to exchange views and share best practices on defence-cooperation. For more information, please visit the ARF website, http://aseanregionalforum.asean.org/.
Key Documents
During their annual meeting, the ADMM issues a Joint Declaration signed by the ASEAN Defence Ministers while the ADMM-Plus usually issues Joint Statement on certain issues of common concern aside from the usual ADMM-Plus Chairman’s Statement.
Publication and Related Links
Further information on the ADMM/ADMM-Plus, such as that on its activities and agreed initiatives could be accesses through its online portal.
